


the storm we're starting

by Muir_Wolf



Category: Leverage
Genre: Multi, OT3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-28
Updated: 2016-10-28
Packaged: 2018-08-27 14:55:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,662
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8406052
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Muir_Wolf/pseuds/Muir_Wolf
Summary: She leans over the railing, her fingers snug around the metal out of experience, not of fear.  She leans over further, feeling the wind scrape against her bare face.  Her hair is safely tucked away, and she leans over a little more, looking at the sprawling world below.  She always has loved skyscrapers.  It’s not even the thrill - it’s the freedom.





	

_i._

 

The wind is absolutely _howling_ , to the extent that Parker’s having a hard time hearing anything, let alone the voices in her ear. She can hear the rhythm of the words, though, and it’s enough for her to know that Nate and Eliot and Hardison are bickering, which means that Sophie’s probably about to chime in in a minute and wrap things up satisfactorily. It’s kind of comforting, actually, just hearing familiar voices and the flow of their conversation without being able to make out the words themselves - sometimes she does that on purpose, even, just tunes them out so they’re background radiation.

She leans over the railing, her fingers snug around the metal out of experience, not of fear. She leans over further, feeling the wind scrape against her bare face. Her hair is safely tucked away, and she leans over a little more, looking at the sprawling world below. She always has loved skyscrapers. It’s not even the thrill - it’s the freedom.

“Parker!” Nate says. There’s a bit of a bite to his voice, which means he’s said her name more than once. He gets prickly about things like that.

“Is it time?” she asks. She’s already stepping over the railing before he can respond. She waits for that first affirmative syllable and then she’s airborne.

 

_ii._

 

Eliot’s making the face. To be fair, Eliot’s got a lot of faces, but this is Hardison’s favorite - when Eliot’s trying not to like something but is fooling absolutely nobody. Well, maybe somebody. Maybe somebodys that haven’t spent way too many days knocking around against Eliot’s shoulders and learning his faces - for their own personal safety, of course.

Hardison grins, and waves a hand in front of his own face, before gesturing at Eliot. “You’re making that face again, man,” he says, because just because he learns things that _could_ improve his personal safety does not at all mean he’ll ever take his own advice under advisement. Eliot’s eyes narrow. It’s charming, really, how predictable he is.

“I’m not making a face,” Eliot says.

“Oh, you’re making a face,” Hardison says. Eliot’s face does that other thing that Hardison loves, that twitchy annoyed and oh-so- _open_ look. “Still making a face,” Hardison says, because he loves the way he can get under Eliot’s skin.

 

_iii._

 

Parker’s hands are pressed against Eliot’s side, his skin slick with blood.

“Hardison, faster!” she says, like it’s something that needs to be said, like Hardison isn’t already gunning the engine and spreading the distance between them and the guns behind them.

“It’s okay,” Eliot says, that half-smile on his face that Hardison always either scoffs or swoons at. Parker’s never done either. Parker’s always taken it at face-value: Eliot’s trying to get her to do something instead of asking her to do it. (Hardison says that’s not what face-value means, but it’s on Eliot’s face, isn’t it, so Hardison is wrong.)

“Stop it,” she says, blowing upwards to try to get the loose strands of hair that have fallen into her face. Eliot lifts a hand up, hesitates for a moment, and then slowly pushes the hair back from her face and tucks it behind her ear. His fingers are spotted with blood. It’s good that Hardison’s driving, he’s never been good with blood. He’s bad at compartmentalizing.

“Stop what?” he asks, all slow southern charm, which means that it must really be hurting bad.

“It’s me, Eliot, stop trying to tell me how to _feel_ and start telling me what to _do._ ”

He smiles again, crooked and warm and self-effacing all at once, and she wants to shake him, wants to _fix_ him, wants to stop feeling anything but the blood-warm skin underneath her hands.

“Sorry,” he says.

(She ignores it for now, but when he’s stitched up and lying in a hospital bed, safe and mostly sound, she forgives him.)

 

_iv._

 

Eliot’s finished making the caramel popcorn, but he’s still standing in the kitchen. There’s something incredibly...domestic about this--about Hardison, because there’s not a domestic bone in Parker’s body, so this has gotta be Hardison’s fault. Definitely Hardison’s fault that he’s standing in the kitchen, about to go into the living room where Parker and Hardison are probably curled up on the couch, ready to start the movie. Both their faults, probably, that he wants to go. 

“Eliot!” Parker yells from the other room, impatient as always.

“Come on, man,” Hardison calls, “we’re gonna be up all night if we don’t start the movie soon!”

Eliot's walking towards them before he even realizes he's moved.

 

_v._

 

Parker is standing on the other side of the locked door, the keys dangling in her hand, her wide eyes luminous. 

“Parker, what are you doing?” Hardison asks. His voice is low, and deep, and entirely separate from the way his hands want to start shaking.

“You need to get to safety,” she says. She smiles, and it’s uneven and terrible and Hardison is going to rip the door off its hinges with his bare hands if she doesn’t stop.

“Parker, don’t do this,” he says, and doesn’t let himself think about how close his voice is to begging, how begging wouldn’t work anyway because this is _Parker_ , and she always knows her own mind.

“It’s a job for a thief,” she says. “You’ll only get in the way, or get yourselves killed.” She puts her hand against the glass window of the door for a moment, and Hardison’s seen her get softer and more open and more - god, everything - but this - seeing her standing there, her hand on the glass, it’s killing him. Behind him he can hear Eliot catching up, and she must hear it, too, because her eyes dart over to the long hallway behind Hardison. “It’ll be fine,” she says. She says it like she means it. Like she believes it.

And then she turns, and runs away from the door, just as Eliot catches up to Hardison and puts his hand on Hardison’s shoulder.

“Where’s Parker?” he asks, looking at the door, at Hardison’s face, at the empty corridor on the other side of the glass window. “No,” he says, his voice turning rough and angry, “don’t tell me she’s gone off half-cocked on her own. Get out of the way,” he says, lifting an elbow up like he’s going to break the window. Hardison catches his arm before he can complete the movement.

“These doors are alarmed,” he says. “You break the window, you set off the alarm, they know there’s intruders, and Parker’s still in there alone but now with thirty guards looking for her.”

“So what, we just let her go?” Eliot asks. Hardison shrugs.

“I think we gotta have her back and be ready to catch her, but trust her that she's got this,” he says.

 

_vi._

 

“Out of curiosity, have y’all ever tried actually using words instead of pulling self-sacrificing stunts? Like, just wondering.”

Eliot turns shifty immediately, stepping back on one foot and shifting all his weight onto that back foot, giving himself miles and miles of distance in one easy move. Parker runs in a more subtle way - everything external switching to internal, until she’s standing there like a blank slate. It’s honestly infuriating that Hardison’s stuck with these two idiots. Just, completely infuriating. 

“It’s the play that made sense,” Parker says. Hardison’s considering yelling, but Eliot beats him to the punch.

“You don’t get to decide that on your own,” Eliot says, low and growly and _angry_ , oh Eliot’s _angry_. “We’re a team, and that means we act like a _team._ And I can’t protect you if you’re going off--”

“I was protecting _you._ ” Parker says, bright-eyed.

“I don’t need you to protect me!”

“Doesn’t mean we don’t want to,” Hardison cuts in. His voice is low, but enough to break through their own rising voices. Eliot stops, and swallows.

“I can’t do my job if I’ve gotta worry about you two running into danger without me,” he says.

There’s a long, steady silence.

“Okay,” Parker says. “I shouldn’t have locked the door. I should’ve explained my plan and trusted you to trust me.”

“Yeah,” Hardison says. “You should’ve.”

 

_vii._

 

Eliot had graciously backed out of going over to Hardison’s - at least, he thought he had. Except when he comes out of the bathroom, Parker and Hardison are sprawled out on Eliot’s couch, Parker no-doubt purposely fiddling with her lockpicks as she smirks up at him.

“You still grumpy?” Parker asks. Eliot narrows his eyes slightly, and goes over to the fridge.

“Gonna be like that, huh?” Hardison asks from behind him, but Eliot’s just grabbing three beers out, and Hardison subsides as he catches a glimpse of Eliot’s hands.

Parker and Hardison have left the middle cushion open, and Hardison’s blatantly waving hand is indication that it’s gonna be a whole thing if he tries to sit elsewhere. Besides, he doesn’t really want to sit somewhere else.

As soon as he sits, Hardison shifts so that he’s leaning slightly against Eliot’s side. Parker’s sitting with her legs crossed, but her arm brushes companionably against Eliot as she grabs one of the beers from his hand. His skin prickles where he can feel the heat of their bodies, but he ignores it.

 

_viii._

 

Parker is standing in front of Eliot, with Hardison at her side. They’ve talked about it, and decided that Parker’s always the one who likes jumping off of buildings. In front of her is Eliot; in front of her is the entirety of the sprawling world below. Her hand is snug around Hardison’s out of habit, not out of fear.

“Parker,” Hardison prompts her, checking in, checking to make sure she’s still on board. Eliot is watching them, annoyed and skittish.

She steps across the floor, dragging Hardison with one hand, her other hand coming up to cup Eliot’s cheek.

She feels airborne even before he starts kissing her back.

_._

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] the storm we're starting](https://archiveofourown.org/works/8849407) by [Shmaylor](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shmaylor/pseuds/Shmaylor)




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